April 09: Preparing for badminton.

(From Bristol Evening Post)

With Badminton just around the corner, the eventing season is getting ready for the first climax of the year. The field of competitors is always strong at Badminton - it's the world's biggest event and every year riders travel from Europe, America and the southern hemisphere to compete.

However, this year the four-star event at Lexington in America has also attracted some of the bigger names, such as Nicolas Touzaint and Lucinda Fredericks, both of whom will compete with their previous Badminton winners (Hilgado de L'lle and Headly Britannia).

Taking European-based horses to Lexington instead of competing at Badminton may seem odd as Badminton is more prestigious and there are obvious costs in flying horses to America. However, not only does it give riders the opportunity to add another four-star event to their CV, it also takes the pressure off by avoiding having to defend a Badminton title, a hard task in a sport where the odds are heavily against even the favourite and competitors don't often have the prolonged winning streaks seen in other sports.

It will be interesting to see what this year's course brings. Course design at the top level is a frighteningly difficult task and the designer has to come up with new ideas since the questions set, however difficult at first, are soon learnt by both horses and riders and, within a matter of seasons, are no longer testing enough. Fences built at the top events are emulated at other smaller competitions and, within a couple of years, miniature versions appear at all levels, including pony club.

Last year I wrote about how difficult it is to predict where course design can move from here, but Hugh Thomas (Badminton's course designer) came up with a suggestion of curving distances set very close together on ambiguous strides. For example, the two fences into The Lake were set on a curving two and a half strides, forcing riders to commit on an entirely different approach, line and pace to get the forward two strides, as opposed to the holding three. Either option was possible, indeed a well designed fence will cause the riders to consider each option, but the result was that the less accurate ended up somewhere in the middle, on two and a half strides, and in the bottom of the fence.

At this stage, the horses will have had their last one-day event run before Badminton, but many will have a final cross-country school and ...